I've heard it said in the trade press recently that this is the year of 4k. Well yes, that's what the pros
want (and ever higher resolution) and that's definitely what the trade wants
given the need for continuous churn of products to induce profit. But there's a
substrata of need within education and corporate work and also to there's a
need to make available Digital Cinematography concepts for television work. So
Blackmagic Design, well know for graphics and processing cards and storage
solutions, who then went on to buy Da Vinci Colour Grading software, have now
gone on to creating their first camera. Well known Digital Imaging Technician,
Jonathan Smiles has been quoted as saying that "as soon as light hits the
lens it's all post production", and whilst I reject that quite heartily
because it disables a tier of artistic input (i.e. the cinematographer),
Blackmagic's intervention makes this statement all the more true.
I've always considered that
the job of a good cinematographer is to be the chief quality control clerk of
the production and that they of all the roles should understand completely the
pathway from light into lens through to light emitting from or bouncing off the
screen - so the Blackmagic camera which comes with connectivity through
thunderbolt and then through Da Vinci Resolve management system (including
scopes) takes the whole Digital Cinematography concept one stage further on in
its development from what it once was in the age of photo chemical imaging.
In Los Angeles the
Global Cinematography Institute understand that everything is changing
and now seek to train the modern cinematographer right across the whole gamut of
roles in the image making process - they call this Expanded Cinematography. Though still regarding lighting as the highest
achievement of human sensibility, akin to the work of a renaissance painter,
they know that the cinematographer has this earlier responsibility that has
been shirked since post and colour grading started to take over in the ‘90’s. Times
are again changing and it would do well for the trainers and pedagogues who
teach the new generation of film-makers to be aware of the way that things are
realigning. Digital Video is dead, long live data cinematography.
